News

Mark Purdy: Don't get too excited about Manny Ramirez signing with the A's

By Mark Purdy Mercury News Columnist

Posted:
02/20/2012 01:23:32 PM PST

Updated:
02/21/2012 11:19:27 AM PST

You know those times on the freeway when, all of a sudden, cars ahead of you stop for no apparent reason? And you wonder why? And then you go far enough to see that the frustrating backup is simply being caused by rubberneckers slowing down to see a crash by the side of the road?

That's how I feel right now about the people who are excited about this Manny Ramirez deal with the A's. They are rubberneckers. And he is the car crash. Or he will be, soon enough.

Ramirez was looking for a place to land after a lost 2011 season in which he "retired" after he tested positive for banned drugs for the second time in three years. The A's decided to provide the landing place. It may sell them a few extra tickets this summer to those rubberneckers. But Ramirez's recent history shows that it's only a matter of time before he becomes a liability rather than an asset, or is suspended, or gets lost on the way to the Coliseum.

This is why nobody should become too excited about Monday's agreement. In fact, it is probably an overreaction to have any real reaction to the move.

On a practical basis, the decision is non-monumental, cheap and low-risk for the A's. The deal is for one year. They will pay Ramirez just $20,000 more than the major league minimum salary of $480,000. If he is a bust, it won't be a huge financial disaster. If he is fabulously great, he will be vastly underpaid.

But he isn't going to be fabulously great. Ramirez will not be eligible to play a major league game for the A's until he finishes serving a 50-game suspension. If there are no rainouts, he will be permitted to suit up for Oakland on May 30. That happens to be his 40th birthday. Yet two years ago at age 38 with the Dodgers and White Sox, his power was already in noticeable decline, with nine home runs in 320 plate appearances.

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Logic says Ramirez won't be more powerful or more on top of his game at age 40 -- especially after taking only 17 at-bats last season with Tampa Bay (and accumulating exactly one hit) before announcing his "retirement."

And even if Ramirez can find a way back to respectability as a major league slugger, he probably will find another way to get in trouble and be gone, anyway -- either via suspension or ejection or through obnoxious behavior that forces a midseason trade or giveaway, as occurred with the Dodgers in 2010.

Keep in mind that on Ramirez's final at-bat in L.A., as a pinch hitter, he argued a first-pitch strike and was thrown out of the game. That's your classic latter-career Manny moment, right there. During the 2009 playoffs with the Dodgers, Ramirez famously was pulled from a game in the top of the ninth inning and immediately took a shower instead of sticking around in the dugout to support his Dodgers teammates when they suffered a demoralizing defeat in the bottom of the inning. He shrugged off being in the locker room and missing that collapse by saying: "I caught the highlights."

The man is a character, no doubt, and his presence might have some value as an amusing sideshow unless you actually care about the A's alleged rebuilding plan. Billy Beane, the general manager, has been selling the idea that his drastic offseason choices to deal away top pitchers for young hotshot prospects with potential are calculated. Allegedly, those young hotshots will put the A's on track to become contenders in 2015 or 2016 when they occupy a theoretical new ballpark in downtown San Jose.

But if that plan is for real, where does Ramirez fit in? In the past, Beane has enlisted such veterans as Frank Thomas, Mike Piazza and Nomar Garciaparra to add punch and/or set a professional example for the less-veteran Athletics. However, Ramirez is hardly in the setting-an-example business. And he will take away some at-bats from the younger talents such as Chris Carter, Daric Barton, Brandon Allen and the promising Cuban free agent, Yoenis Cespedes.

What, then, is Ramirez doing in an A's uniform? Other than slowing down the traffic, that is?

By June, it says here, Manny will have a new nickname: The Human Sigalert. And by August, he will be gone. Try to contain your excitement.